Type: Public event

The Role of Special Interests in American Politics

Date & time

May 8-9, 2015, 8:00 am-12:15 pm EDT

Location

Weill Hall, Betty Ford Classroom
735 South State St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109

Free and open to the public. Please RSVP.

Hosted and co-sponsored by the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy with the Political Sciences Department, this program features some of the best scholars of interest groups, policy advocacy, and social movements in the country.  The papers presented span three disciplines (Political Science, Economics, Sociology) and include work that is experimental, formal, historical, comparative, qualitative, and quantitative. They deal with a number of topics, including corporate and nonprofit advocacy, health and environmental policy, and campaign finance.

Organizer Contact Information:

Ashley Broas: [email protected]

Rick Hall:  [email protected] | 734-730-5404

Michael Heaney: [email protected] 

Geoff Lorenz: [email protected] | 512-739-7522

 

Conference Schedule:

Day 1:  Friday, May 8

8:00:    Continental Breakfast (Great Hall)

8:30:    Welcome and Opening Remarks

8:45     Panel 1 -- Paradoxes of Power

  • Mark S. Mizruchi, “Individual Power, Collective Weakness: A Reconsideration of Dahl’s Thesis”
  • Matt Grossmann, Lee Drutman, and Timothy LaPira, “The Interest Group Top Tier: Why ‘More Groups’ Does Not Mean ‘Less Clout’”

Discussant: Frank Baumgartner

10:00 – Break

10:15   Panel 2 – Lobbying Congress

  • Beth Leech, “Subsidizing Agendas” 

Discussant: James Strickland

  • Lee Drutman, “How Lobbyists Perpetuate Lobbying”

Discussant:    Jesse Crosson

  • Janet M. Box-Steffensmeier, Dino P. Christenson, and Alison W. Craig, “Cue-Taking in Congress: Interest Group Signals from Dear Colleague Letters”

Discussant:   Geoff Lorenz

12:15   Lunch (Great Hall)

1:15     Panel 3 – Lobbying Beyond Congress         

  • Charles M. Cameron and John M. de Figueiredo, “Information and Lobbying in the American States: Theory and Evidence”

Discussant:  Jake Haselswerdt

  • Simon Haeder and Susan Webb Yackee, “Lobbying the U.S. President’s Office of Management and Budget”

Discussant:    Richard Anderson

2:30     Break

2:45:    Panel 4:  Strategies of Effective Advocacy

  • Robert Van Houweling, “Political Pledges as Credible Commitments”

Discussant:   Dan Carpenter                                                 

  • Edward Walker, “Social Media, Documentary Films, and Grassroots Advocacy: ‘Gasland’ and Anti-Fracking Campaigns, 2010-2013”

Discussant:  Zander Furnas

  • Adam Fremeth, Brian Kelleher Richter, and Brandon Schaufele, “Missing Money in Politics”

Discussant: Rob Van Houweling

4:45     Conclusion of Day 1          

 

Day 2:             Saturday (May 9)

8:00     Continental Breakfast (Great Hall)

8:45     Panel 5 – Grass Roots Movements in Historical Perspective          

  • Corrine M. McConnaughy, “Layers of Activism -- Women’s Movements and Women in Movements Approaching the Twentieth Century”
  • Daniel Carpenter, “Recruitment by Petition: American Antislavery, French Protestantism, English Suppression”

Discussant: Rob Mickey

10:00   Break

10:15   Panel 6 – Citizen Politics?

  • Michael T. Heaney and Fabio Rojas, “Social Movements in a Polarized America”

Discussant: Corrine McConnaughey

  • Rachel Best, “Disease Identity Politics and American Health Policy”

Discussant:  Denise Lillvis

  •  Kay Lehman Schlozman, Philip Edward Jones, Hye Young You, Traci Burch, Sidney Verba, and Henry E. Brady, “Organizations and the Democratic Representation of Interests: What Does It Mean When Those Organizations Have No Members?”

Discussant: Rick Hall

12:15   Concluding Remarks

 

For more information, please visit: http://www.lsa.umich.edu/polisci/events/departmentevents/ci.theroleofsp…